Investigating the Relationship Between Financial Integration and Economic Growth in the East African Community

Abstract

This study set out to investigate the relationship between financialintegration and economic growth in the EAC community states. Secondarydata on financial integration and GDP was obtained from worldbank and theEast African Community(EAC) community secretariat. The data wassubjected to simple linear regression and correlation analysis to achieve theset objective. The study found that, Gross capital flow to GDP (financialopenness) is positively correlated to economic growth (r=0.2093, p <0.05).The study also found that, 3.98% of the variations in economic growth, asmeasured by GDP per capita, within the countries are explained by financialintegration, as measured by the ratio of gross capital flows, 38.98% of thevariations in economic growth between the countries are explained byfinancial integration while 4.38% of the variations in economic growth of theEast African communityEAC as an economic bloc (considering panel data)are explained by financial integration. The findings confirm that, whencapital flows increase, economic growth also increases, pointing to thenecessity of the East African member states to explore ways of increasing thecapital flows between the countries. The researcher recommends conductingof a comparative study between the old and the new EAC to establishwhether the inclusion of Rwanda and Burundi, has had any positive impact(catalyzed) on the level of financial integration and economic growth.